No, it really isn’t an argument. And you’ve been condescending to me all thread. Anyone can see.
Yes, this is a valid argument which is not what you have int he OP. It is not of logical necessity that “expensive things are replaced by cheaper things.”
You feel that I have been condescending to you. That’s right and that’s the reason why you are full of resentments because of this post, so you look for a chance to revenge. Your last posts have just proved it.
Are you a child? A re you a woman? If yes, then excuse me.
You have not understand the question which is the TITLE OF MY THREAD and the TITLE OF MY OP: Will machines completely replace all human beings?
Child, you would have saved much energy, if you had listened to me! I have told you a number of times: "Please read the thread, if you don’t undesrtand the TITLE OF MY THREAD and the TITLE OF MY OP!
Will machines completely replace all human beings?
?
Well, I am not going to continue the conversation since you really aren’t responding to me. Please have someone else explain to you how I am not disagreeing with “logical truth.”
I have to disagree.
As soon as anything void of artificial goals accomplishes stability, it stops growing. The sub-atomic particle grows only to a specific size then swells or shrinks such as to maintain its form. The molecule doesn’t alter its form at all unless it has a weak point that another atom can join to such as to plug the hole. The DNA molecule merely plugs holes in its structure until it gets inadvertently broken in half such as to restart the effort. Replication takes place only because stability wasn’t sufficiently achieved.
Every empire has fallen because it grew too large to be stable. If the Roman empire had been managed properly, it would still be there today. But rather than manage things properly, they seek more and more and more until they breakup into smaller pieces. The same has been true of the Egyptian empire, the English, the French, the Ottoman, the Prussian, the USSR, the Catholic… all of them.
Seeking a presumed need, blind to its relation to stability (anentropy) causes over-compensation; “over-growth”, over-eating, over-spending, overpopulation, over-control. It is called Lust and Mania. And such leads to breaking up and/or death.
The lack of balance/stability/anentropy in an entity brings both its life and its death. If it doesn’t seek anentropy, it either will not grow, or grow too far and die. Not being able to find stability is why life grows and has been for millions of years. It is a difficult thing to achieve and only recently has been within reach. But the continued seeking of power blindly, makes it too difficult to grasp even though within reach.
The “will to power” serves a higher purpose else is destroyed. Anentropy is that purpose to which it WILL bow or perish. History has proven it countless times, not to mention the simple logic of it.
Anentropy is the active compensation for ALL causes of entropy.
Life has been no more than the largely futile effort to accomplish anentropy. Power has always been merely a sub-goal.
Fuse is partly right.
“Since machines can be both cheaper and more capable, will they totally replace human beings?” would have been a better way to ask the question (for those who couldn’t see the intent).
It is not a formal logic proposal, but a question.
Thanks for weighing in, James, but I didn’t point out the structure of his argument to be trivial. I brought it up because Arminius seems to think that “cheaper things must always replace expensive things” is a statement of logical necessity. He has been assuming it, and I disagree with that assumption.
Nope not, buying it. Biology naturally self replicates. A machine does not. A machine will require machines to keep it running and those machines will require machines and guess what metals and materials are finite on this world. Machines are not self replicating unlike biology. That is all just the tip, if I was long winded I could cite more things but, as it is I think you get the idea and can build on it. 
I understand what you were getting at. But what you need to do is provide the counter argument, much like Lady K is attempting (“cheaper will not replace all else”).
But as long as Man is lusting to control all things via Money (which he most certainly is), cheaper things really will gradually replace anything else, including people, and especially people in serious economic trouble such as Japan and the USA.
In fact, as long as Man is attempting to control all things, he will be eliminated. Life does not tolerate remote control for long.
Yes but, James, a human can do what machines cannot. Humans/life can stop machines, machines cannot stop life without causing its own destruction.
I have studied logic, and there is no problem with the question which is the TITLE OF MY THREAD and the TITLE OF MY OP: Will machines completely replace all human beings? It is based on the classical syllogism:
All M are P
All S are M
All S are P
All human beings are mortal.
Sokrates is a human being.
Sokrates is mortal.
Well known, isn’t it?
[b][size=114]1) First premise (propositio maior): Expensive things are replaced by cheaper things.
2) Second premise (propositio minor): Machines are cheaper than human beings.
- Conclusion i:[/i] Human beings are replaced by machines.
(p) Machines are cheaper than human beings, thus (q) human beings are replaced by machines / machines replace human beings.[/size][/b]
Do you agree or disagree?
The materials and metals that are finite also put a “natural” limit on the increase of biological organisms. But, I do understand what you are saying. Upkeep on humans is remarkably low, what with the self healing an all. The real problem is when self healing machines are created, or nano tech. The costs to create and upkeep machines will decrease, the Costs of humans will decrease also… But, impart because of the decrease in costs of machines.
I forgot to include emotional costs for humans, loosing a human has a greater emotional cost than that of a machine, it’s just stuff after all. Also, the intelligence* that a human has that far exceeds (at this point) robots adds to the value of humans.
Though, the underline argument I made is actual real world application. We use machines in situations we could not use a human. The moment a type writer was used instead of something being written by human hands, machines replaced humans. The moment that a plow machine was used instead of a scythe, machines replaced humans. The Luddites smashed machines for a reason… The reason why is because machines are cheaper than humans and human life, they can be thrown away at a lesser cost than a human. Anytime you buy a new toaster it is because that machine is cheaper than starting a fire and cooking it yourself. More, the replacement of humans for machines has increased (at least to most value systems) the life style of most people. Trust me, you do not want humans to be cheaper than a machine, the results are less enjoyable.
An example: In India, where dowries are acceptable, a newspaper ad once read: Man interested in marriage for tractor. Send pictures of tractor.
If human life is cheaper, than people are thrown away before the machine is, I know from other posts that you do not want this. Children are the cheapest of humans, because they have not had as much energy placed in them.
When sex slavery happens it is because the cost of that human is lower than the costs to, well, a lot of things.
The act of creating the immorality of children being used as labor increases the costs of human life as a whole.
I should probably point out, I was answering a specific question:
I have not commented on the OP, nor should my arguments for machines being cheaper be taken as agreement or argument against the OP.
As a formal syllogism, that would be a “non-sequitor” (a disconnect in the logic). You have to have a premise included to say, “Cheaper things always replace more expensive things”. And also, “Only machines replace people”.
And …? Has anybody provided such a “counter argument”?
Has anybody a “counter argument”?
My question is the TITLE OF MY THREAD and the TITLE OF MY OP.
It is just a question. One can answer this question with “yes” or with “no” (therefore also my interim balance sheet), but one has to justify the arguments or counter arguments, if it is requested.
I’m not that good at the logic philosophy, I’m sorry to say. I could move the q’s and p’s around, but pulling it out of the statements always confuses me. So I am approaching this with a huge dollop of humility.
The underline problem is that if one part is false, the whole thing falls apart, no? Because, Expensive things are not necessarily replaced by cheaper things. We have a whole industry called the luxury market, for one. But mostly, the value of something is not always contained with in a simple matrix. Moral value for one is harder to predict a cost on. In economics there is a statement, bad money chases out good. It is under the idea that people hoard the good money, not that they throw it away. For example: In prisons people use the cheap shitty cigarettes as “cash” but keep the good ones to smoke. The active devalue of machines may just mean that machines become more disposable, and are treated more like slaves… (Though, that may be a loaded term)
No, I don’t have to say that because this thraed has already reached an extend of 13 pages and 307 posts. I did the syllogism in the easiest way (as possible) because I had assumed that the most readers are more able to follow the logic in a simple way than in a more complicated way. This 13 pages and 307 posts have proved that. There is no problem because everybody knows the facts (except Fuse, but not really because he has other reasons to “disagree” 
).
[list][list][list]I say: “Cheaper things replace expensive things”.[/list:u][/list:u][/list:u]
[list][list][list]You say (after 13 pages and 303 posts!): “Cheaper things always replace more expensive things”. [/list:u][/list:u][/list:u]
[list][list][list]I say: “Machines replace human beings”.[/list:u][/list:u][/list:u]
[list][list][list]You say (after 13 pages and 303 posts!): “Only machines replace people”. [/list:u][/list:u][/list:u]
After 13 pages and 303 posts, James!
I have never said that it is not possible or not real that people sometimes replace cheaper things by expensive things. But that is not meant in this thread - as evreybody knows in case of understanding the question which is the TITLE OF MY THREAD and the TITLE OF MY OP: Will machines completely replace all human beings?
- If I say “expensive things are replaced by cheaper things”, then it is clear that I don’t speak about “luxus” and so on - generally machines do not belong to luxuriousness.
- If I say “machines are cheaper than human beings”, then it is clear that I don’t speak about toys and so on - generally machines do not belong to toys.
If we go further with “nitpicking”, than we will at last not be able to speak. Speaking and thinking need some gaps or breaks, elsewise there were nothing to speak or think about (because in that case any- and everything were defined for all eternity). All modern totalitarianisms seek definitions for all eternity, and that is very dangerous for all people without power.
Nevertheless we need definitions, but we can not have definitions for all eternity. That’s impossible for human beings, but that is possible for machines.
I am working on a problem called the cure, and i cannot be specific, because it's full of non sequitors, holes. Arguments are sometimes full of holes, because at times, the premise can not contain the conclusion regardless of the number of logical steps.
Here, i see big divide, a disconnect of the very thing James is attempting to show with the inverted pyramid, the backward slanting argument, or arguing repetitiously with difference. There is no paradigm, therefore, the logical either or, is predicated by a new element, his 3Rd man, and although he sustains his notion of formal elements, such as it is, reduced, by increasing numbers of repetitions. The third element, seeks to rise above this logic, and create the synthesis, within a dialectic of reason. This reason, this cure, has preoccupied men from the classical age on, and reached a climax with Hegel. With Hegel, he would see the machine problem as the satisfactory amalgam of man and machine, and as James would have it, within a reasonable marriage of both. That both be harmonized to the best advantage of man gains credible momentum, because it is doubtful, that a machine would self create toward it's own selfish benefit, since, such machine would need to be designed with safeguards. It is undoubtedly questionable, that all work would be delegated to machines, since even in a machine delegated world, control. production of newer machines, and even bypasses to eventual self replicating machines would have to have human overseers. And finally, if evil machines would evolve, to totally displace humanity, men, waging war , because of the probable co-production of man-machine hybrids, would be able to have a Wellsian war of the worlds, benefiting mankind.
But what if, super-intelligent, vastly advanced robot army would try to undermine an evolved cyborg army? In such a showdown, incredibly powerful basis of power would be vested, and there would not be any clear winners, just as the evil empire of the soviet empire could not overcome the mighty western world, and conversely the ideological strength of dialectical materialism may never cease to exert a very powerful force to be reckoned with, as a de-compensating force to limitless capitalisation.
Finally, for this reason,it is compelling to point to connections between classical and post modern aspects of a logic, whose skeleton, is insufficient to hold the the corpus of such a weighty argument.